April was almost ending and I couldn’t locate this dungeon.

It’s supposed to be somewhere here.

Are we there yet?

Did you remember its location properly? Maybe it’s underground?

Well, it should be somewhere here, give or take 20 km.

That is a big margin of error…

We were getting close to the South Igrini river. This river is the southern part of a river that splits off in the Eastern Elven Forest, the place where Sylvana is from. We are quite far from the forest but we can see the forest in the distance from the mountains were on. The river was exiting into the ocean down below us.

Did I misremember the location of this dungeon? I had archived it to be somewhere here. Did it get buried? Or is it in the air? I took a look at the sky but nothing suggested that a dungeon would be up there. I looked down but I only saw dirt and rocks.

I’m tired! Let’s rest!

Ok there might be a chance this dungeon is in some cave.

How about we just avoid caves altogether. Nothing ever good happens when we go into caves.

But if it has a dungeon in it then it makes sense that the cave will cause problems… Maybe I can summon the dungeon by using primal language!

I thought for a bit but it didn’t have a word for dungeon.

Oh, such word doesn’t exist… how did they call it?

Ooh primal language! That sounds so cool!

Is that how it’s called or did you name it that?

Uhh, officially its called Pronam Astentia, and means something like first or original language but they called it Protia. But primal language sounds cooler. It’s a pain in the ass to write and pronounce though.

Ooh, how do I say ‘I’m Raishin’ in primal!

Uhh you should watch out with using this but it should be fine without writing the runes however some words even carry their effect without them. So, you would say ‘Astimi Raishin.’

Oh that’s not hard! Astimi Raishin! Does my name have a meaning in primal?

Uhh no, Greg is the same and my name… oh.

And what does your name mean?

Well, ‘Agnis’, means ‘fire’ it seems. I wonder if my mother knew, probably not since my name is derived from the word Agnisotra, which means purifying flame. Maybe the phoenix language was inspired by the primal language.

So, you will basically say that you’re fire if you introduce yourself? Greg backed off and created [Shadow cloaks] around Raishin and himself

Go for it.

Uhh as long as I don’t write the rune it should be fine.

I got this, let’s see what happens, I’m curious. Greg started layering defensive skills.

Hey, isn’t that overkill?

Just do it!

Astimi Agnis. I felt a bit warm but nothing happened.

See?!

Now with that rune of yours, it’s not much but you just increased in temperature.

Fine.

I drew the rune which represented fire. I was wondering if this was coincidence. Maybe the old language of the phoenixes was a branch of the primal language they placed a big importance on fire after all.

Astimi Agnis.

I felt warm again but this time the whole place got blasted. I looked at my hand and it looked like I was made out of fire. I think this would have killed me if I didn’t had such a high resistance. It got to the point that even I could feel the heat. It didn’t bother me, yet. It seemed to buff my fire affinity to the moon.

This state reminds me a bit of my [Silver Torrent] state but weaker and simpler. In the [Silver Torrent] state I’m made out of silver lightning, now I’m made out of fire. This effect however only lasted for 2 minutes before it disappeared.

Greg appeared from his [Shadow Dome] and looked at the surroundings.

This was hotter than usual. It also felt different from normal fire, magic fire or the fire you use with your Dragonvein. Any clue what it is?

Uhh Primal fire? I have no clue. I don’t think I should use this though. It punches through my fire resistance. Look I have some singed hairs.

I showed the hairs on my arm.

Ok don’t introduce yourself in Protia with runes. Don’t forget this!

Yes yes. Let’s see what other names would have a similar effect? I guess Nilah would turn blue but she already is blue. Do you think someone would be named Mortyu? He would instantly die if he introduced himself.

I have not yet met anyone with that name.

How about names for chicks!

Uhh Anis? It means end? Might also die.

Maybe that’s how the primals died! They introduced themselves to each other and got annihilated!

I would hope that they were not stupid enough to go out like that…

Agnis look, you melted a part of this mountain and it revealed the dungeon. It’s glowing. It might have been activated by the heat.

The dungeon was cooling off because the incandescent glow was going from light yellow to red and the dungeon disappeared from sight and detection once it cooled off enough.

I have to say, these ancients surely are creative in hiding their dungeons! I’m torching this place again and let’s get in before it disappears again!

Greg and Raishin sat down and observed.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Don’t you need to shield up?

You can control your fire, right? Friendly fire is off remember?

Dragonvein doesn’t care though…

I connected to the underground leyline currents, shifted my stance and zapped Raishin.

Ouch! Ok! We will back off!

Raishin and Greg backed off and Greg put up some protection.

I used [Fernys magma Pit] on where the dungeon had disappeared. It took a while but the incandescence revealed the dungeon. It seems to be able to take a lot of heat before its temperature would rise. I let the magma pit heat up the dungeon until it glowed white hot. No puzzle was needed to get inside, just resistance to heat. I put [Frost cloaks] on Raishin and Greg and we walked into the dungeon.

The door closed behind us. No dark room, no monsters. Just a large round room with an enormous uncompleted jigsaw puzzle on the floor. The walls had 4 strange images, one on a cardinal each.

What a terrible artist. What are these things supposed to be?

No clue.

This is fascinating!

I linked up Greg and Raishin with my eyes. Nothing seemed off. Just solving the jigsaw puzzle. This one seems a bit different. Every piece was double-sided, one had a light blue border another side a red border. The spot where we were supposed to solve this puzzle on had 6 pieces that were already on a set spot. These couldn’t be moved, 3 had red borders and the other 3 had blue borders.

Now there was one problem. This puzzle was partly completed, which suggests that someone has been here before. I looked to the side. Raishin was poking 3 skeletons leaning against the wall.

These aren’t monsters that are going to attack us, right?

I think they were the ones that tried this puzzle before and failed.

Ugh. We will be fine right? We are immortal!

I think dying is better than being stuck here forever.

We will solve this puzzle so that is not a concern. But Agnis look at these images! I don’t understand them but the artistic genius it took to create this.

I had forgotten that Greg is such a nerd in this. I couldn’t make anything out of these 4 images. They looked extremely abstract to me. Then suddenly one portrait changed a bit.

I looked at Raishin who had just randomly placed a piece in this puzzle.

Hehe, Greg you’re such a noob, this isn’t art, it’s just a random image which seems to change when a piece is laid down. Raishin put some more pieces down!

Raishin put 5 pieces down and 2 parts of the east image changed. 1 of the west image and 2 of the north image.

So, we need to solve this jigsaw in such a way that all images make sense?

I have no clue but that sounds obnoxious enough. What worries me are those borders though.

I walked over to the puzzle and crouched down. My estimate put this jigsaw on 3000 pieces, not difficult for tailed beasts like us because we can come up with solutions by putting our tails to work. It is sure to have more obnoxious effects. Why are there 6 pieces that are always set in their place with their corresponding borders.

Do you think they gave us these 6 for free to help us out?

If there is one thing, I know of these dungeons then it is that nothing is free. Let’s leave Greg nerd out on this place. I will complete a part around this red bordered piece, you do the one over there with the blue borders.

It was a mess in here because the pieces were everywhere. Looking for a piece took longer than figuring out what the jigsaw was supposed to look like. The complete image was probably as abstract as the images on the wall. I tried to match the pieces by using the red bordered side but that seemed to be impossible. A cold wave swept over Raishin and me and it drew our attention.

I looked over at Raishin. The blue piece he started to solve around showed a number 5 and every jigsaw piece that was within a range of 5 pieces around it turned blue bordered. One image on the wall changed drastically and the walls turned clockwise.

Uh oh, I have a bad feeling about this.

Guys, head’s up something is coming through the image.

The image that had changed the most started to ripple and an ice yeti came out of it. It was quite small but it grew in size to about the size of a normal ice yeti.

I got this! You guys continue solving that jigsaw!

Greg got out his hammer and started to kick the yeti’s ass. It is just a normal monster so it should stand no chance against Greg.

I finished a part around my piece and it glowed and showed a 3. Everything within a radius of 3 pieces got a red border. Another image changed a lot and the room turned counter clockwise. The image started to ripple and a horde of flame wolves hopped out. Greg [Shadowbound] all of them, created a large [Shadow Vortex] pulling them to a small area and used [Liberation] on them and swiftly wiped them out.

So, the monsters here are no problem for us. Humans might have had issues with the amount of wolves that hopped out of the image but they were quite weak. The yeti also should be no problem from humans. So, what is the problem here? Why did they die? This jigsaw isn’t extremely difficult.

We kept looking for the pieces we would need and an hour had passed.

Hey Agnis, I need that piece over there, I think. He pointed at a piece that I had put down 20 minutes ago.

Hmm, take it let’s see what happens.

He took the piece and placed it but nothing happened. I helped him finish a part around a fire bordered piece. It glowed red after we finished at least 6 rows of pieces around it. It showed a 6 and all the pieces in a radius of 6 had their border turn red. I then spotted the problem. Their shape also changes when this happens.

The usual happened. An image changed a lot, the room turned counter clockwise and some fire related monster jumped out of the image and grew in size until it matched the size it usually is. This one seemed tougher but Greg had no issues soloing this.

Hey Agnis, I don’t think we can solve this like a normal jigsaw puzzle, the shapes and colors keep flipping.

Yeah, I think we need to solve these in order of the numbered pieces. We need to find 1 and then solve the area around 1 then 2 etc. We might even have to take all the pieces off to reset this. Greg this is going to take a while!

That is fine.

What if that’s not the way to solve the puzzle?

Uhh, then we’re screwed. Do you have an idea?

Not really but what if we need to turn the puzzle into one color.

Hmm that also seems quite hard and obnoxious. What if we have to surround these set jigsaw pieces with the opposite color?

Ugh, there are so many options! Which one is the correct one?

Hey, guys I have an idea! What if there are 4 types of solutions?

Greg pointed toward the four images on the walls that kept rotating.

Are the ancients really that nice or are each of the solutions going to give us a pain in the ass boss to fight and we could live or die by randomness?

I think that would be extra obnoxious. You would be wondering if the other 3 solutions would have been better.

That sounds pretty obnoxious to me. These ancients were assholes.

So what solution are we going for Raishin?

How about we do rock paper scissors, if I win, we go with my solution and if you win, we go with yours! But no cheating with your eyes!

Fine! Don’t come crying if you still lose!

Best out of six?

Why six? That’s an even number, how about best out of 9!

How about best out of 7.5?

You’re trolling right?

We decided on a bet out of 9 but we kept drawing.

Right, I will leave a clone behind and investigate more.

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